Coulda Woulda Shoulda

Despite his phobia of higher education, Rick Santorum showed on Tuesday night that he is capable of learning. But the lightbulb in his head may have clicked on a little too late. Conceding his narrow defeat in Michigan, Santorum set aside the culture-war logorrhea that likely cost him a narrative-changing win over Mitt Romney, wore a beaming smile that proclaimed “Hey, I’m no angry prophet of doom!” and began the proceedings with a warm tribute to the “independent women” in his life—a far cry from Satanic warnings and dire concerns about women serving in combat and using birth control. “My 93-year-old mom,” Santorum said, was an “unusual person for her time.” She got a college education in the '30s, you see, and then a graduate degree. Heck, “She was a professional who actually made more money than her husband.” (Wait—he’s proud of this?) And there was more: He didn’t call Romney a “joke” or a “bully” as he had done in the frantic final days before the Michigan and Arizona primary contests. There was no vomiting over church-state separation, no comparing the president to Hitler—none of the stuff that undercut his “Big Mo” in Michigan. The rest of Santorum’s speech was relentlessly focused on his populist economic message, and demonstrated his greatest advantage over Romney: He can speak Middle American fluently. If this had been the Santorum who campaigned across Michigan the past two weeks, he’d have been proclaiming victory. Instead, he leaves the state headed into Super Tuesday with self-inflicted wounds that have him looking less “electable” than ever.

So They Say

"President Obama has traded in the hard hat and lunch bucket category of the Democratic Party for the hipster fedora and a double skim latte."

As Republicans head to the polls to select a U.S. Senate candidate who will almost certainly hail from the right, Michelle Nunn and Jason Carter--daughter of Senator Sam and grandson of President Jimmy--take the middle path on a road destined to veer left.